FEEDBACK FRIDAY: This Week in Natural Dye Questions

This week: Liquid dyes for silk flower making and what’s up with those red marks when dyeing with madder?

Every week, we are emailed with questions from our natural dye community asking simple and complex questions that we thought might be worth sharing. Of course, all of your burning questions are answered by natural dyer in chief, Kathy Hattori, Founder of Botanical Colors.

I am a hat maker from Spain and I would like to use natural extracts for silk flower making. I wondered how “dense/intense” the Aquarelle liquid dyes are and if you reckon I could use them directly on the silk (previously scoured and mordanted), just with a brush (as I have been doing with Procion type dyes) and not by bathing.
I also wondered that, as I would need to buy some extracts anyway (I need the dye stuff in powder to make the stamens of the flowers), maybe it is not worth it to buy the aquarelle (if this is extract diluted in water).

What would your recommendation be? I would really appreciate your advice.

It is possible to dilute the liquid dyes with water or to use them directly from the bottle, undiluted. The silk fabric needs to be mordanted with aluminum sulfate. Be aware that the color does not develop until heat is applied by steaming the flowers.

The powdered extracts are stronger, so they may be a better choice. Dissolve them in hot water, then dilute as needed. Also, these must be steamed. It sounds like the powdered extracts will provide you with the most flexibility. You can mix any depth of shade that you want, and only use as much powder as you need.

Every time I dye with madder extract I get deep red spots on my fabric. I am usually dyeing cellulose based fibers when I use it so first scour with washing soda and then mordant with aluminum acetate. Am I supposed to be putting the fabric in the cold dye water then bringing it up to right temp? I keep the clothing I am dyeing loose and moving freely (and frequently) as I dye. Can one put too much dye in a bath and get blasts of deep color spots like that? Why am I getting these and how can I get rid of them?
If you are getting red spots and mordanting with aluminum acetate with a calcium carbonate post bath, then try rinsing the fabric before adding it to the dye bath. Calcium carbonate can deposit unevenly on fabric as it is not soluble in water, and it also is used to redden the madder bath. It could be that the excess calcium carbonate on the fabric is causing the dye to strike unevenly.
You may also need to dissolve the dye better prior to adding it to the dye bath. If the dye is not thoroughly mixed and dissolved prior to adding to the bath, there is a chance that particles will collect on the surface of the fabric and cause spots. Use plenty of very hot (boiling) water to mix and dissolve the dye. If necessary, strain the dye bath through a cheesecloth filter, and then work on dissolving the remaining sediment and re-filtering.